Newcastle United lucky not to have encountered administration

Words by Kevin Doocey on


Mike - Love him or loath him he’s kept NUFC in a financially stable condition

You only have to look at Portsmouth FC to see what the economic recession is doing to football. Stoke City’s 1-2 win against Avram Grant’s side was rumoured to have been the last ever game played in Fratton Park, however whether this is true or not, I really don’t know. Either way, Pompey are in a serious financial mess at the minute and the signs for the future are not good at all. With a winding up order chasing them around for the last month, whether the final straw in the 2008 FA Cup winners, has been well and truly pulled we’ll see in a matter of days.

We can’t feel guilty about this as Magpies though. After all, we tried to help them, dishing out £1m for Mike Williamson. That however, is only a drop in the ocean of the funds needed to keep this club above board.

As much as you can fault Mike Ashley for ruining this club and dragging us into the Coca Cola Championship, we could very easily be in the situation Portsmouth find themselves in. Relegation is a huge disappointment for all sectors at a club. With the likes of Michael Owen, Mark Viduka, Damien Duff, Habib Beye and so forth all earning huge money from the club, it was unsustainable to keep them lads at the club.

Not only that though, the likes of Coloccini, Jonas, Barton, Smith, Ameobi, Taylor(s) all still earn a wage that most league 1 clubs wouldn’t dish-out to their entire staff in a week. Footballers are over-paid for sure, but I won’t be getting into that because I might only reduce some Toon fans to tears with the facts!

Mike Ashley’s reported £25m loan to the club is reported to keep this club running and pay the players. Ashley wanted to sell a few times now but couldn’t find a suitable buyer, however in fairness he kept the club on it’s feet with the money both generated from transfer fees and some of his own cash.

Many suggest he pocketed the sales money from Shay Given, Damien Duff, Obafemi Martins and so forth but I really do doubt it. Very easily, Newcastle United could’ve been history. It’s just lucky that we are where we are in the table, aloft the Championship and looking good for promotion. Mike Ashley is as keen as any Toon fan out there to get promoted, and especially to avail of the juicy TV revenue deals and the many other sources of income.

Here in my own country Cork City who once harvested the likes of Kevin Doyle, Ipswich’s Damien Delaney, Roy O’Donovan from our neighbours Sunderland, Dave Mooney now on-loan at Charlton and even Reading’s Shane Long, folded as a club today and were officially no longer a football club.

This is never nice to see and it’s becoming more and more prevalent nowadays with Crystal Palace now under the control of administrators. Thank God it hasn’t happened here on Tyneside and with a Premier League return, we’d like to think it’d never ever happen. However, there’s always a chance in the current climate.

On a different note, Peter ‘Free-Scoring’ Lovenkrands is expected to make the trip to Watford and that’s very good news indeed. Three points at Vicarage Road would be even nicer 😀

Comments welcome 🙂


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